Reservoirs of Faith, Prayer and Scripture Study

Jeffrey Holland about his wife

About Pat, if I had a symbol for her, I'd be torn on these two symbols. It would either be her kneeling in prayer or her cuddled up, curled up, cozied up in a window chair with her scriptures. Maybe if I'm allowed two symbols,  she can read a while and pray a while. That's her, that's the real Pat Holland. That's the real item. I think that's a legacy. She earned it on her own. I guess we all do. At some point you have to go out there and say, "I can't get this any other way than from heaven". She certainly grew up in an environment where she knew prayer, she knew scripture and she knew faith.  That's a great thing to be able to see in any family and I can only hope that that would be the case for families today.
(Mormon Channel Conversations 22 36:15)

Pat Holland, speaking about a particularly difficult period of their lives

It's during these trials of fire that a true marriage is forged. It's a decision I think that you have to make as a couple. When you get in these moments, you have to decide you are going to both dig down deep and do what it takes to keep your marriage together. It was during those years that we said, "Okay, if we want a happy family, we've got to be a happy couple. And if we are going to be a happy couple, we've got to work on it. We need to do something for each other every week, with each other. If our children are going to be happy children, it's got to start with them seeing happy parenting. And then we put the children second and then whatever energy we had left over we gave to the church. We tried to do it all, but first and foremost it's each other and then the children and then the church.
(39:58)

Elder Holland adds

President Harold B. Lee came back at that time while we were there and gave a fireside on that subject and really affected our lives. He said so often we rush off to either deal with the children or serve the church or get our professions. And all of that needs doing. All of that has to take time. But he said, we are foolish to think that we can do any of that unless we take care of our own physical and spiritual strength. And then the very next step is as a couple. Just not go beyond that circle till you've got enough to give.  You can't expect some sort of reservoir to flow out to bless everybody else if that reservoir is bone dry. We really made a commitment to each other then that we'd make sure we were okay in our marriage and in our own spiritual and physical lives and then maybe we'd have enough strength to give. (41:21)

Sheri Dew quotes Pat, "If I were Satan and wanted to destroy a society, I think I would stage a full blown blitz on its women." A Quiet Heart